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FLOWERS FROM NO ONE
AFTER ARMAGEDDON'T
Armageddon hadn't happened, and the whole world was better off because of it.
One of the ways that it was better off, was the fact that Crowley's marvellous Bentley was back in one piece, as glorious as ever. Not so much as a singe or a tarnish. The demon felt the overwhelming need to celebrate, and the way he decided to celebrate was this: He would travel to every single city in the country, and blow out the power of one overpriced supermarket in each one of them. Something ridiculously irritating. Something that couldn't /quite/ be classed as evil. Something that would have annoyed the collars in hell to no end, had they still had any jurisdiction over him. Which, apparently, they had readily relinquished after Aziraphale's Stunt In The Bathtub.
Crowley enjoyed his round-the-isle trip. He discovered entirely new dialects to swear in. He enjoyed himself so much, that, one afternoon, he'd considered making it a worldwide tour. However, he thought lazily, sipping a rather decent Merlot at a cafe in rainy Yorkshire, considering the Bentley fire, and so narrowly escaping the worst the pits of hell had to offer, he'd had quite enough /heat/ for the foreseeable future. He looked out over the Yorkshire moors, the watercolour clouds and sheets of miserable drizzle. Yes, he decided, this would do nicely.
As he travelled, Crowley thought of Aziraphale. Not that he missed the angel, no not at all. Hadn't they spent decades without bumping into each other before now? And one time, that whole century that he slept through? Still, no matter how Crowley tried to reason it away, he found himself imagining how the angel would react to a particularly funny town sign (Who the hell thought Wetwang was an appropriate name for a village?!) or how he was coping after the stresses of the last few days. The last few years, come to think of it. This whole eleven years had been nothing but stress and anguish, and Aziraphale was probably just as relieved as he was to have some time to kick back and worry about nothing for a while.
Probably.
Crowley wondered what Aziraphale would look like, 'kicking back'. He always wore that ridiculous waistcoat these days. Would he take it off? Unfasten that fussy tie, maybe loosen his buttons? The demon's jaw clenched, and a speed camera clocked him doing 112mph through a school zone.
A WEEK-NEXT-TUESDAY
The Bentley was parked at such a terrible angle that drivers on the already narrow Soho road had to slow right down to carefully manoeuvre around it. Crowley ignored all the vague threats and the cursing, and stared across the road at A.Z.Fell & Co.
Who the heaven was the angel laughing with in that bloody bookshop?
Crowley squinted, and considered taking off his sunglasses to work out exactly who it was. A man, of some sort.
Another angel?
He sniffed the air warily, and wound the driver's side window up just a little. Surely not an angel. He'd be able to tell, wouldn't he? And would another angel be laughing with Aziraphale? Probably not an angel. The man left the shop the way any man leaves a shop - straightening his jacket and heading purposefully in a direction. He was wearing denim jeans. Definitely not an angel.
Crowley relaxed a little, but he was now more perplexed than ever. This wasn't just a customer. The two had been laughing away together. Does the angel laugh with his customers? He'd always seemed to do everything possible to keep them out of his shop.
Had The Man been aware of anything but getting to his destination as fast as he could, he would have spotted the big black Bentley tailing him along a busy Soho street, causing a traffic jam that resulted in two missed interview appointments, a missed flight and a very nasty break up.
A bakery. Really? A bakery? Crowley watched as The Man headed inside, and stepped behind the counter. /His/ bakery. The Baker. The Baker's Bakery. Didn't look like the sort of place where he'd get time to read old and expensive books. So why the interest in his angel? Crowley didn't like it. Not one jot.
So, he decided to watch.
THURSDAY
The cafe opposite the bakery had an excellent view of The Baker. If ever there was a spot where someone could sit down anonymously, enjoy a nice cup of tea, and covertly stalk another person, this was it. Unfortunately for Crowley, only one of these worked out for him. He was a coffee person, and the coffee was vile. Halfway through the morning, his anonymity was ruined.
"Crowley?"
The sound of Aziraphale's voice made him dart, and he looked up, wide-eyed, into the pleasantly surprised but rather confused face of the angel.
"I didn't realise you were back! What... what are you doing here?"
Crowley's mouth opened before a retort was ready to fill it. "Um... En... Enjoying a nice cup of coffee?"
"You always hated the coffee here."
"I always hated the coffee here," he repeated back, his mind whirring for an appropriate response. He shifted in his seat, and ran a hand through his hair. The angel looked well. Happier, definitely. And that expression... all teeth and twinkle and crinkles round the eyes... oh he liked that. Had he always looked at him like that? "Where are you off to, Angel?" he asked, diverting the topic of conversation slightly.
"Oh. Well, I've made acquaintances with a local patissier. He makes the most scrumptious croissants and scones I've tasted in the last century! And look, he's given me a loyalty card, as I'm such a good customer." Aziraphale fished a neat little business card from his pocket, and showed it proudly to the demon. It had four hastily stamped circled on it, and a telephone number scrawled out in green biro ink.
Crowley arched a brow. "He gave you his number?"
Aziraphale nodded enthusiastically, beaming like an overzealous sparkler. "In case I ever need deliveries to the shop. He really has the most splendid business model..." He trailed away, his smile faltering a little, as he watched Crowley intently. "It's good to see you," he said, and it was intense, sincere.
The demon swallowed past a sudden lump in his throat. Was his body malfunctioning? "Yeah, it's... good to be back." Breaking the eye contact before it compacted the air between them, he glanced back towards the bakery. The little black sign on the door now read, CLOSED. "Does he have a name then, this baker?"
"Paul," Aziraphale told him absently, glancing at the bakery too. "Oh bother, looks like I missed him." Turning back to Crowley, he stuffed the loyalty card back in his pocket. "Do come to the bookshop, it hasn't been the same without you."
Crowley didn't need asking twice, and soon found himself in a situation he'd often found himself over the last few decades - walking side by side with his angel towards his angel's bookshop, with the hopes of getting very very drunk in the next few hours.
The bookshop had changed.
Pulling a face at the overpowering smell, the demon picked his way into the bookshop, choosing a route that would disturb the least amount of flowers. There were flowers /everywhere/. Roses, lilies, tulips, daffodils, sunflowers, chrysanthemums... Crowley felt a little bit sick. "Um... change in decor?" he pointed out redundantly.
"Hm? Oh, the bouquets, aren't they lovely? Paul sent them." Aziraphale headed over to his desk, setting aside a bouquet that had yet to be arranged, and performed a little miracle to set out a steaming and inviting tea tray. He gestured to it, smiling welcomingly at the demon.
"/Paul sent them/," Crowley mocked under his breath. He went to perch on the edge of the desk, purposefully crushing the heads of the unvased bouquet. "Don't you have anything stronger?"
The angel shook his head in a manner that clearly meant 'shame on you'. "It's the middle of the day, my dear!"
Ohh, he'd missed that. Crowley felt something in his chest lurch at that little turn of phrase. The unbidden idea crossed his mind that perhaps he used it with /Paul/ too. His face twisted a little, and his fingers clenched on the stem of a tulip. "You do realise, of course..." one demon leg came up to rest on the desk in what was the most ridiculous attempt at looking nonchalant, "that this Paul is just trying to get into those lovely beige trousers of yours?"
Aziraphale's hands slipped on the teapot, causing a loud clink of upset china. He looked up at Crowley in abject disbelief. "I beg your pardon?"
"Beg all you like, it's obvious." He picked up the remains of the tulip, turning it over in his hand and idly inspecting it. "Why the heaven would a random baker send you flowers, hm? And not just flowers, but flowers upon flowers upon sodding flowers?!" What had been a tulip was now crushed under his palm.
He watched as the angel's mouth gaped in astonishment for a few long moments. "I... He thinks they go with the aesthetic of the shop." Aziraphale sputtered, reaching out defensively to brush the leaf of a particularly beautiful rose. "And my trousers are not /beige/," he added in an undertone.
There was no way Crowley could stay here, not with a scent like three florists and a garden centre in one medium-sized bookshop. He stormed out, the vases of blooms shivering just a little as he passed them.
"Crowley!"
A FORTNIGHT-SATURDAY
Crowley had overreacted.
He knew that from the moment he'd exited the bookshop. There was no way a /human/ could stand any chance with someone as impressive, someone as ethereal, as his angel. But then again, as the days passed, he'd kept an eye on Paul the Baker. And he didn't like what he saw.
The man was charming, and smiley, and pleasant. He was clearly interested, as Crowley had suspected, but from what Crowley could see, Aziraphale was quite oblivious, brushing off the gestures of affection and ignoring entirely the longing gazes. (Crowley had spent an entire afternoon inhabiting the space of a few atoms above the angel's cash register, to get a better view to observe, and had been rather amused to see the frustration build in Paul's countenance as Aziraphale managed to obliviously blunder his way out of a fourth brush of the hand).
He wasn't about to stand for this.
Crowley decided that something had to be done.
A train of thought is exactly that - a train. It can take you anywhere. It can take you exactly where you intended, along the route you intended, in about the length of time you'd expect. It can take you on a wild scenic route, with diversions and temporary lights, but get you more or less where you wanted to go. It can derail and crash into oblivion, leaving a trail of chaos and flame. And sometimes, you can get on the train expecting to get to Edinburgh, panic about the route, the time, and whether or not you've got your ticket, and half an hour later find yourself in Ipswich.
This is what happened to Crowley, as he arrived at a terribly convoluted and unnecessary reason to call Aziraphale to St James Park. He himself would bring bread for the ducks.
"You really think they're watching us?" Aziraphale asked nervously, glancing around at the passers by. They'd been caught out here once before, of course, and the thought that it could happen again made the angel quiver in his boots. "But they let us go, they... we're on our own side, you said as much yourself."
"Yes, I did..." Crowley trailed off, and threw a piece of crust at a particularly persistent mallard. "But I heard a thing and it... it was disturbing. They're watching us for... um..." His train hadn't quite landed in Ipswich yet. "They're trying to catch us out. Anything they can use against us." He sounded paranoid, and ridiculous. It was a piss poor excuse, and he knew it, but he had had to see the angel. Away from the shop. Away from all of Paul the Baker's bloody flowers and pastries.
Aziraphale patted his arm, and the demon jumped, dropping a full slice of bread. "I really think we're alright, my dear. I haven't been bothered by heaven, and you tell me you haven't been hounded by... well. Hell hounds." He glanced at Crowley as though he didn't /quite/ believe him. "So, for now at least, it seems we have been left to our own devices." Why did the angel sound so nervous. "We're all on our own, you and I."
"But we're not on our own, are we?" Crowley muttered. He was almost pouting. "It's you, and I, and St Paul the Bloody Baker with the Roses." He huffed, and threw the remainder of the bread into the water in one lump.
Aziraphale sighed. "Not this again," he complained. "Crowley, your wild ideas that he is somehow /infatuated/ are quite ridiculous. Come here, and I shall prove it." He took Crowley's arm a second time - though Crowley didn't jump as much this time - and the two vanished, reappearing almost instantaneously outside the bookshop. Aziraphale fumbled with his keys.
"Mr Fell?"
They both turned. A delivery man stood behind them in the doorway, peeking out from behind a large bouquet of wildflowers. Crowley hissed low and loud, and Aziraphale took a glance at the card poking from the flora.
"And who are they from?" the demon asked redundantly, through gritted teeth.
The angel turned pink. "No one," he said, his voice far too high to be natural, even for him.
And with that, Crowley had gone.
THE FOLLOWING MONDAY
Crowley was disgusted with his own behaviour. He and the angel had been through literal heaven and hell together, and he was going to let some pathetic human come between them now?! The world at large had reason to call him many things, but 'cowardly' was not one of them. Demons weren't cowardly. Well, that had proved to be less true than he originally thought, what with the trial and all, but nevertheless, /this/ demon certainly wasn't a coward. Which was why he found himself, partway through a mild Monday afternoon, stood outside A.Z. Fell & Co., clutching a bouquet of the finest azaleas the country had ever seen. He'd bought them days ago, but due to significant amounts of threatening language, he'd managed to keep them looking perfect.
He huffed. If Aziraphale liked flowers, then sodding flowers he'd bloody get.
Aziraphale was not on the shop floor. Crowley's shoulders fell imperceptibly, and he set the bouquet down on the desk. Wandering off to the rather specific 'Deadly Disasters of Biblical Times and Why We Shouldn't Worry Too Much About That Sort of Thing These Days' section, he found himself idly passing the time, until the bell rang on the shop door. He glanced up, and instantly felt the venom he'd once possessed seething through his veins.
That bloody baker. How /dare/ he...
"Ah, Paul, to what do I owe the pleasure?"
Crowley got it. Kind of. Aziraphale was pleasant enough to everyone, unless they got in his way. If they provided him with pastries, he could be positively delightful with them. It was understandable that all that charm, that warmth, that pure loveliness could be misconstrued into thinking he was interested. Poor Paul. Poor, stupid, pathetic Paul...
Crowley watched through a gap in the bookcase.
Paul looked a little sick. He gave a smile that came out as more of a grimace. "Aziraphale." His voice wasn't confident. "I'm afraid I'm going to have to take that loyalty card back. I'm relocating." He sounded genuinely sorrowful about this, though the words were tainted by an underlying fear.
The plastered smile on Aziraphale's face faltered. "Oh, really? What a shame."
"I know, it's uh... rats." Paul made a face. He was sweating. "Rats and mice and cockroaches, and... yeah, the whole place is swarming with them. I'm moving to Newcastle."
"Ah." The angel gave what could almost have been a genuine smile. But Crowley had seen enough of his actual genuine smiles to know the difference. "Well, I'm sure there'll be plenty of opportunities for an excellent baker in... Newcastle." He looked down at the new arrival of flowers on his desk. "Azaleas," he remarked, picking up the bouquet. "My favourites. But I'm sorry, I... I don't think I can accept these."
Crowley frowned. He'd had a whole shop full of them for weeks and now he was rejecting a bouquet. /His/ bouquet, even though Paul seemed to be getting the credit. Paul hadn't known Aziraphale's favourite flower...
"Oh, uh, no, they're not from me," Paul insisted, taking back the proffered loyalty card, and scrunching it up in a trembling clenched hand. "You take care now." That grimace was back again, and Paul the Baker removed himself from the shop so fast he practically fell out of the door.
Paul the Baker would never set foot in a bookshop again. They gave him vertigo, or so he told people.
THAT NIGHT
"Well. This is certainly new."
Aziraphale strolled up to the bridge barrier, settling himself to lean against it and look out over the river, alongside his demon.
Crowley glanced at him. "Yeah, thought we could do with a new tradition." He held up a paper bag, filled with pastry boxes. "From a tiny little place up here. Family run. Nice kids."
Aziraphale took the bag. "Thank you," he said quietly after a moment. Then a longer pause. Traffic rolled across the bridge behind them, but they didn't hear it. It wasn't there, to them. "And I owe you an apology." He shifted, looking uncomfortable. Crowley turned to face him properly. "It seems you were right. About..." he seemed nervous again, "about the baker. His intentions were... well. What you said they were."
Crowley shrugged, but inside he was celebrating in the way only a demon knew how. I cannot tell you what that way is, because I am not a demon.
"You were jealous."
The celebrating came to an abrupt halt.
Turning now to face the angel, Crowley tried to look as offended as possible. "Jealous? Me? You're ridiculous, Angel! Utterly ridiculous. Completely nonsensical." He could tell straight away that his voice was anything but convincing. "I don't care what you do. Why would I care what you do? Let the whole of London into your /beige/ trousers, for all I care..." He trailed off, knowing he sounded utterly ridiculous. He huffed, and looked out over the water again.
The angel stepped closer, a warm heat radiating where their arms pressed together, as they both leaned on the railing. "Thank you for my azaleas," he said quietly.
There it was again, that bloody lump in Crowley's throat. He really should give himself some sort of MOT - this couldn't be healthy. His heart was hammering too. "Weren't from me," he insisted just as quietly.
A small smile played on Aziraphale's lips. "Flowers from no one," he murmured. "Again. How delightful."
Crowley felt a warmth beside his hand, and looked down. A warm angel hand brushing his, against the cold metal beneath. He failed to swallow the lump in his throat, as his own fingers brushed back.
YESTERDAY
One angry demon held the collar of one befuddled and terrified human across the counter of one horrified bakery. Or at least, that's how it felt. Crowley was merely glaring at him, but Paul the Baker was rooted to the spot, breaking out in hives and almost hyperventilating. He did not like this.
"Such a shame you can't stay," Crowley was saying, eyeing a cockroach that had miraculously found its way into the immaculately clean bakery. It ran up the baker's arm, but he could do nothing to stop it. Another followed. "Seems you've really overstayed your welcome. Some people are really unhappy about you being here. People, in this case, being me."
He leaned closer, and removed his sunglasses. A low, strangled whimper emanated from the baker's throat. "So I suggest you trot along, hm? Somewhere far away. Somewhere, say, away from bookshops and book keepers. How about that?"
The baker nodded enthusiastically. It was the only response he could give. Crowley grinned, and just for a moment, Paul was convinced he saw a forked tongue peek through those sharp teeth. "There's a good lad."
MIDNIGHT IN SOHO
There was a singular light in the window of the most singular bookshop in London. Not the harsh light of an overhead bulb, or the dull glow of dusty lamps, or even the flickering, slightly too-warm light from a group of candles. This was a practically impossible to achieve light, perfect in every way, somehow. Miraculously.
An angel arranged a bouquet of azaleas in a crystal vase in that window. He admired them with a smile as warm as the light.
A demon brought him a glass of wine. He took it, and murmured something to him. We can't tell what is said, because we are merely observing from a little cafe across the street. The curtains twitch closed, and the light dims perfectly. Two shadows entwine. And angels drank in Soho.